AADHAAR RELATED ARTICLES: 11975 - Centre’s food subsidy bill set to be slashed courtesy Aadhaar, PoS

In 2009, I became extremely concerned with the concept of Unique Identity for various reasons. Connected with many like minded highly educated people who were all concerned.

On 18th May 2010, I started this Blog to capture anything and everything I came across on the topic. This blog with its million hits is a testament to my concerns about loss of privacy and fear of the ID being misused and possible Criminal activities it could lead to.

In 2017 the Supreme Court of India gave its verdict after one of the longest hearings on any issue. I did my bit and appealed to the Supreme Court Judges too through an On Line Petition.

In 2019 the Aadhaar Legislation has been revised and passed by the two houses of the Parliament of India making it Legal. I am no Legal Eagle so my Opinion carries no weight except with people opposed to the very concept.

In 2019, this Blog now just captures on a Daily Basis list of Articles Published on anything to do with Aadhaar as obtained from Daily Google Searches and nothing more. Cannot burn the midnight candle any longer.

"In Matters of Conscience, the Law of Majority has no place"- Mahatma Gandhi

Ram Krishnaswamy

Sydney, Australia.

Aadhaar

The UIDAI has taken two successive governments in India and the entire world for a ride. It identifies nothing. It is not unique. The entire UID data has never been verified and audited. The UID cannot be used for governance, financial databases or anything. It’s use is the biggest threat to national security since independence. – Anupam Saraph 2018

When I opposed Aadhaar in 2010 , I was called a BJP stooge. In 2016 I am still opposing Aadhaar for the same reasons and I am told I am a Congress die hard. No one wants to see why I oppose Aadhaar as it is too difficult. Plus Aadhaar is FREE so why not get one ? Ram Krishnaswamy

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.-Mahatma Gandhi

In matters of conscience, the law of the majority has no place.Mahatma Gandhi

“The invasion of privacy is of no consequence because privacy is not a fundamental right and has no meaning under Article 21. The right to privacy is not a guaranteed under the constitution, because privacy is not a fundamental right.” Article 21 of the Indian constitution refers to the right to life and liberty -Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi

“There is merit in the complaints. You are unwittingly allowing snooping, harassment and commercial exploitation. The information about an individual obtained by the UIDAI while issuing an Aadhaar card shall not be used for any other purpose, save as above, except as may be directed by a court for the purpose of criminal investigation.”-A three judge bench headed by Justice J Chelameswar said in an interim order.

Legal scholar Usha Ramanathan describes UID as an inverse of sunshine laws like the Right to Information. While the RTI makes the state transparent to the citizen, the UID does the inverse: it makes the citizen transparent to the state, she says.

Good idea gone bad
I have written earlier that UID/Aadhaar was a poorly designed, unreliable and expensive solution to the really good idea of providing national identification for over a billion Indians. My petition contends that UID in its current form violates the right to privacy of a citizen, guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution. This is because sensitive biometric and demographic information of citizens are with enrolment agencies, registrars and sub-registrars who have no legal liability for any misuse of this data. This petition has opened up the larger discussion on privacy rights for Indians. The current Article 21 interpretation by the Supreme Court was done decades ago, before the advent of internet and today’s technology and all the new privacy challenges that have arisen as a consequence.

Rajeev Chandrasekhar, MP Rajya Sabha

“What is Aadhaar? There is enormous confusion. That Aadhaar will identify people who are entitled for subsidy. No. Aadhaar doesn’t determine who is eligible and who isn’t,” Jairam Ramesh

But Aadhaar has been mythologised during the previous government by its creators into some technology super force that will transform governance in a miraculous manner. I even read an article recently that compared Aadhaar to some revolution and quoted a 1930s historian, Will Durant.Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Rajya Sabha MP

“I know you will say that it is not mandatory. But, it is compulsorily mandatorily voluntary,” Jairam Ramesh, Rajya Saba April 2017.

August 24, 2017: The nine-judge Constitution Bench rules that right to privacy is “intrinsic to life and liberty”and is inherently protected under the various fundamental freedoms enshrined under Part III of the Indian Constitution

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the World; indeed it's the only thing that ever has"

“Arguing that you don’t care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don’t care about free speech because you have nothing to say.” -Edward Snowden

In the Supreme Court, Meenakshi Arora, one of the senior counsel in the case, compared it to living under a general, perpetual, nation-wide criminal warrant.

Had never thought of it that way, but living in the Aadhaar universe is like living in a prison. All of us are treated like criminals with barely any rights or recourse and gatekeepers have absolute power on you and your life.

Announcing the launch of the # BreakAadhaarChainscampaign, culminating with events in multiple cities on 12th Jan. This is the last opportunity to make your voice heard before the Supreme Court hearings start on 17th Jan 2018. In collaboration with @no2uidand@rozi_roti.

UIDAI's security seems to be founded on four time tested pillars of security idiocy

1) Denial

2) Issue fiats and point finger

3) Shoot messenger

4) Bury head in sand.

God Save India

Wednesday, September 6, 2017

11975 - Centre’s food subsidy bill set to be slashed courtesy Aadhaar, PoS - Financial Express

http://www.financialexpress.com/economy/good-news-centres-food-subsidy-bill-set-to-be-slashed-courtesy-aadhaar-pos/842919/

Centre’s food subsidy bill set to be slashed courtesy Aadhaar, PoS

Haryana cuts 25%, Rajasthan a fifth; ePoS-enabled fair price shops, Aadhaar-seeding of cards help.

By: Sandip Das | New Delhi | Published: September 6, 2017 5:37 AM

Rajasthan had reported a similar weeding out of fictitious beneficiaries under the National Food Security Act. (Reuters)

The state government believes that the sudden drop in the number of buyers is due to ePoS-induced transparency, which curtailed the scope for manipulation of purchase records and diversion of grains meant for the public distribution system (PDS) to the open market.The new systems for monitoring transactions at fair price shops (FPSs) are promising to help slash the Centre’s food subsidy bill, the most sticky among its revenue expenditures, after pension and interest payments. Around a quarter of ration card holders in Haryana haven’t apparently turned up for collecting the provisions since June, when all 9,500 FPSs in the state started using electronic point of sale (ePoS) machines and Aadhaar-seeding of ration cards was made mandatory.

Earlier, Rajasthan had reported a similar weeding out of fictitious beneficiaries under the National Food Security Act (NFSA): After the state’s 25,000 odd FPSs were ePoS-enabled in September last year, the beneficiary list got pruned by about 20%.

The Centre’s food subsidy bill is projected to be Rs 1.45 lakh crore in FY18, under the medium-term expenditure framework released by the finance ministry recently, and the subsidy is seen to rise to Rs 2 lakh crore in FY20.

According to SS Prasad, additional chief secretary, Haryana, who heads the state’s Food Civil Supplies Department, after the state government stopped providing monthly entitlement of grains to around 40 lakh PDS beneficiaries among the 1.24 crore people covered under NFSA in June, around 10 lakh got their Aadhaar cards made and seeded with ration cards while others haven’t since turned up at the retail shops.

Against a monthly allocation of around 66,000 tonnes of wheat from Food Corporation of India for distribution to NFSA beneficiaries, the Haryana Civil Supplies Corporation is now lifting around 50,000 tonnes of grain mainly because of the reduction in the number of beneficiaries.

Of course, death, migrant labourers going back to their respective states, persons shifting out of the state after marriage, etc, prune the PDS list. “Compulsory Aadhaar seeding has made fake ration cards redundant,” Prasad said. The Haryana government has also introduced ‘portability’ of ration cards where each beneficiary can claim 5 kg of highly subsidised wheat as monthly entitlement under NFSA across any ration shop in the state.

Haryana has 29.68 lakh ration card holders of whom more than 90% so far have had their cards seeded with Aadhaar. Those who have not seeded their ration cards have been allowed to approach any FPS in the state to submit their details.

Haryana is one of six states to have installed e-PoS machines in all FPSs, the other five being Madhya Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan. In coming months, these and other states are also expected to get rid of the redundant ration cards through Aadhaar-seeded PDS transactions and e-PoS-enabled tracking.

The government wants to make Aadhaar mandatory for receiving subsidised foodgrains under PDS, but what the Supreme Court says on this after the recent judgment making privacy a fundamental right is crucial.

Since 2013, 2.48 crore bogus/duplicate ration cards have been eliminated in the country, with potential savings of Rs 14,000 crore to the exchequer. Of a total 5.27 lakh FPSs in the country, around 47% or 2.45 lakh have installed ePoS machines. Around 80% of the total 23 crore ration cards in the country have been seeded with Aadhaar.